


In Denial, Darkness Thrives

by UnkindledAsh



Series: Fireteam Agdistis Stories [2]
Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Gella doesn't really get how to healthily soothe trauma but she's trying, Gen, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Misgendering, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Transphobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-16 03:14:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29569443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnkindledAsh/pseuds/UnkindledAsh
Summary: No matter how strong someone is, the Dark is a patient hunter and it always knows your vulnerabilities. The Light may heal their bodies, but every Guardian suffers wounds beyond the physical. Failing to tend to these wounds may not immediately be disastrous, but no one can outrun the dark thoughts they push away.Content warning: The Darkness's attempts to manipulate the narration involves it insistently misgendering one of my Guardians. Its obsession with dichotomies and simplicity leaves no room for Sefi's nonbinary identity. If that's likely to bother you, tread lightly.
Series: Fireteam Agdistis Stories [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2172417
Kudos: 5





	In Denial, Darkness Thrives

They were pinned. All three of them were stuck behind cover for fear of the mad Dark Guardian with a cursed heavy machine gun. Sefi felt hollow, like a gnawing emptiness clawed at their center. Their immortal second life couldn’t end this way. Not now, ||she’d|| come so close in figuring out their origins and ||she|| still had so much left to do. Still, the center couldn't hold, instead continuing to fracture and fall away into a ||welcoming, yearning|| black pit. They felt cold. They hadn’t felt that way since- ever. They had an illusory idea of what life was like before being resurrected but they had no real memories. ||The ones she had were stolen from many times over.|| 

And yet, they felt cold. They explored the feeling, poked it like a festering wound that they willed to fix itself. Then ||she heard it, the whisper of salvation||. That long, slow, patient whisper at the edge of ||her|| consciousness that always was there, worming its way into ||her|| thoughts. The more they examined it, the ||colder she became||. Eventually they felt their inherent warlock need to impose themself upon reality. And the cold became physical, and they could feel it tearing at their delicate circuitry and motors. So they pushed it back long enough to fashion a conduit of light - a crude staff - and then dove headfirst back into that cold feeling. ||She was now immersed in this feeling, this power to preserve what was important to her, forever. And she had a perfect conduit to test her emptiness upon. She rose from her cover, a sucking void craving warmth.|| 

Immediately, the first belch of gunfire issued from the Dark Guardian’s Hive magic-corrupted gun. It was a simple matter to deflect the bullets with flash-frozen matter. The world descended into beautiful tones ringing out across the battlefield in a symphony. Light, dark, and mundane energy all plucked individual strings and Sefi could hear it all. They realized that their instrument they fashioned was a magnificent bow for ||playing the instrument called physics|| and rasped it across the strings of reality in the direction of the fool who’d dared to try and end them with his own paltry instrument. ||Her-|| THEIR response was full of a hollow fury. It must consume and so they pointed the emptiness at the overgrown child holding the gun he didn’t understand. 

Sefi was real. Sefi was law. They could no longer be denied themself. They had become void. ||Not the comfortable, silent emptiness of the Light.|| This was a screaming lack at their very center. They found that the Dark Guardian’s fear filled their void. They drank his terror as the ice began to encase him. He vibrated with such majestic and all-consuming panic as the chill and emptiness tore at him. When they were satisfied he had been tapped, they discarded him with a dismissive wave and his frozen form crumbled. The emptiness ebbed and they could feel warmth again, and light, and the shouts and fear of their fireteam and then they felt gravity reclaim their floating form and-

Sefi awoke back on Brigid’s ship. Which was odd, because they all flew here separately to meet up. Where was their-

“What the fuck, Sefi?” Brigid snapped. Brigid never snapped though…

“Wh-”

“That was Darkness you were channeling. You saved all our asses but… what have you done?” She was bereft. The Titan crumpled under the weight of months of fear she’d been bottling up and Sefi immediately felt a stab of terrible fear of her own.

“I saved us for once-” Sefi began weakly. They knew they’d crossed a terrifying threshold largely out of curiosity.

“Saved us nothing. You damn near froze everyone nearby. Including our Ghosts. Lucky is with Gella right now. He doesn’t want to be near you until we know you ARE you. They're afraid you’ll pull a Dredgen Cull.”

That was too much. Sefi felt the fear steadily ferment into anger. “I’m hardly a fucking Dredgen, Brigid. You’re all overreacting.”

“Am I?” Brigid asked, with a finality that made it register as a statement. To punctuate it, she lifted a datapad. It was combat footage from Gella’s ghost. Sefi watched themself with growing horror. They watched the silent moment of embracing the void, the microseconds of experimentation required to fashion a Light-conduit for the Dark. And then chaos as their empty eyes expressed that emptiness on reality. The ice hadn’t just spread towards the Dark Guardian. It was everywhere. Lucky had already fled Sefi’s side and was fearfully babbling at Brigid and Guy for help. Brigid was simply booking it away and signalling for Gella to retreat as well. Then Sefi realized why the Dark Guardian hadn’t taken a second shot at them: They’d driven their fireteam members out of cover and accidentally used them as bait. That he couldn’t pick a target and shoot was irrelevant, they’d endangered their fireteam. They then forced themself to watch them torture the man with ice for a distressing amount of time. In the fight it had felt like less than a second, but Sefi could clearly count 15 full seconds of abusing their powers against the restrained foe.

"A full explanation now. Or I fucking space you." Brigid's voice was wavering, extremely hurt, and deadly serious. She trailed off with, "Can't believe I helped you out of the Cosmodrome..."

Sefi could only stare down at the bulkhead, trying to figure out where to start and how to word it. They began haltingly, "I… found anomalous ruins while exploring on Io. This wasn't long before the Pyramids arrived. Lucky and I got jumped by some Vex and couldn't fight our way out. I ended up alone somewhere very far down. Eventually, I ended up somewhere very, very dark. Even Lucky couldn't light anything. And the whispers came. They were like the ones we Exos usually get but different. I recognized my own voice whispering at me down there. I asked Lucky if I was going insane, if the Exo body rejection- the- the- what's the term? Fuck it, you know what I mean! Anyway, I needed to know if it could be happening. He said no. That there was no way. The Light should prevent it. Eventually, when I was about to just give up, days, maybe weeks later ... I could feel the dark recede. I had to physically grasp Lucky and use that reprieve to transmat out. When I was aboard the ship, I asked Lucky about it, and he didn't even remember touching down. So what was talking through him that whole time I never discovered… Then the pyramids arrived and I realized that the same hopelessness I felt down there was tugging at me again, and with it came bitter, icy numbness. The kind I'm not totally supposed to feel, even with this body. And recently, I realized there's Dark in all of us-"

"If that's supposed to be your idea of a grand moral statement…" Brigid interrupted.

"NO! The Dark! Capital T, Capital D. In us Exos. We're literally juiced with the stuff."

"There's no way. You're fucking with me…" Brigid reflexively tried to back away in vain from the terrible news.

"I made a little jaunt to Europa. Got a tip from a vision after getting my head caved in by a Minotaur in Gambit. I saw it- the Red Spot on Jupiter hanging ominously in the sky like a pupil fixated on something far away. And ice, for miles. Ice, and dead Exos. And then I heard rumbles about Dark Guardians gathering on Europa. So I went. I didn’t find Dark Guardians. I found Fallen, millions of them. And Vex. And ruins older than the both of us. And they stank, B. They stank of death even after however many fucking years it’s been. But you know what else I saw? Dead Exos- maybe. Maybe they never got minds uploaded. But our kind were lying slain there by the thousands. And that emptiness grew a little more. And then- and then I found a Vex and an Exo in a tank together. Floating in that same fluid that leaks out of us when we get shot up too bad, that same shit the Drifter puts in some of his weird guns. But concentrated like that? In that tank and untouched by a Ghost? I could damn near taste that dark energy. And then now, B… when I thought I was gonna lose you and Gella…”

Brigid slackened. An impossibly large thud reverberated through the all-too-small craft’s hull as she slumped in her heavy armor against a bulkhead, cradling her helmeted head in her hand. The last few months had been a lot on every Guardian. Even seeing the Traveler healed hadn’t eased everyone’s sheer terror. The Traveler was in peak shape when the Darkness first came to Sol, after all. Brigid felt like she’d be weeping if she had real tear ducts right now. That fact just made her more aware of the veins of pure evil that probably still pumped through her. Sefi was many things, but they didn’t half-ass research. When they said something with confidence, it might as well have been law. Brigid tightened into a curl against the bulkhead, as though that could ward off the bad feelings. She wanted so badly just to break something and transfer her feelings through her fist. That’s what she always did when she felt bad, and there was usually never any lack of righteous targets for such catharsis. But now it was her and Sefi in a confined space and they’d have to work this out here and now. Brigid roughly slapped both sides of her helmet and stood up with renewed confidence and purpose. “Take me there,” she said simply to Sefi.

Sefi nodded mutely. “Can I get back to my ship? I’ve got the coordinates stored in that computer…”

Brigid nodded, radioing Gella, “Hey. We’re good here. Let Lucky back over. He’s safe. Sefi is… Sefi knows where their loyalties lie.” She paused, releasing the transmit button and turning her inscrutable helmet to Sefi before continuing, “That New Light you helped out in the Cosmodrome? You keep her safe. I hope to the Traveler you don’t ever see what this feels like. Hold on tight.”

Less than a second later, the airlock opened to hard vacuum and Sefi saw Lucky sail through the gap cheerfully. He’d bet on them so long ago and hummed with the certainty that he’d chosen right to revive the horned Exo he found discarded next to the entrance to a civilian shelter. He buzzed over immediately to Sefi’s semi-listless body and they cradled him gently in their hands. One scare wasn’t enough to break the bond between Guardian and Ghost. Sefi’s body convulsed, and they imagined they’d be crying if they had something to simulate it. Guess old Clovis saw no reason to reproduce that in an undying soldier. Old fool, thought Sefi, it’s these moments that a soldier should live for. Lucky had already started transmat by the time they’d embraced him but he appreciated the gesture. From the cockpit of her own jumpship, Brigid granted Fireteam leader status to Sefi as a show of faith and Sefi punched in coordinates on the ostensibly cordoned-off moon of Europa.

...

In-transit, Sefi laid out their drop plans. They’d be transmatting in only a few kilometers away from the entrance to a secret Eliksni city. Using the sensor cover provided by an unknown orbital station, their ships would make a steep dive and drop them off to assault an ancient bunker or lab south of Eventide. It was a high-risk operation just to kick rocks in some old hole but it seemed important so Gella didn’t object. Golden Age human settlement should be pretty good loot regardless. 

The first thing that hit the team was piercing cold. It cut straight through armor. They could only trudge through the hard-packed snow miserably for about 500 meters from the drop point. Even if Brigid and Sefi couldn't feel it like Gella did, it definitely made normal function feel wrong and disquieting, like something could break down at any second. They couldn't help wondering if maybe the Exos here had been designed with extreme cold weather conditions in mind. The second thing that hit the team was weapons fire from a handful of scout shanks. The trio rapidly dispatched the first few with ease but a Fallen ship was already coming in above them. Either they’d been detected coming in or they had terrible luck. Either way, they weren’t in a position to fight a Fallen detachment of unknown size. They dashed hurriedly to the coordinates for the bunker entrance and prayed they weren’t followed. Eventually, they found the inexplicably open entryway to a BrayTech science facility.

Gella’s voice crackled over comms as they shuffled into the shiny metallic hallway, “This should’ve been frozen over and filled years ago. This is Golden Age?”

Sefi could only wordlessly point to the BrayTech branding that adorned the walls. They then motioned for silence and for the other two to follow. They pulled out a scout rifle to peer from cover at the end of the corridor. They nodded to Lucky wordlessly and Lucky projected the room ahead to the other two Guardians. It was full of Vex idling for no understandable reason. Silently, the 3 debated with hand gestures how best to clear the room ahead. From a place of experience, Sefi cut through the objections of the other two and insisted that they would open up and the other two should simply cover their breach. As soon as they saw the notion register in the others, they immediately tore around the corner charging up a Nova Bomb. The viscous glob of gravity slammed into the leading Hydra and warped it briefly before tearing at its component pieces. Eventually, even its molecular perfection gave way between Light-induced gravity and collapsed, fizzling and exploding. Brigid and Gella entered not far behind, dropping suppressing fire on any of the Harpies not caught in the initial blast. Within seconds the first room was clear and more Vex warped in. These, too, fell under bursts of gunfire and Light. 

It was in the second room, however, that Brigid began to grow distracted, dropping her pulse rifle to the floor in a haze. As the leading Minotaur’s frame crumpled beneath a grenade shell from Gella, Sefi turned to see Brigid’s gaze. They motioned for Gella to finish the straggling Goblins and laid an empathetic hand on Brigid’s shoulder. "What you see through that glass? What we’ll probably find on this moon eventually? That’s our legacy. The Awoken have The Dreaming City and The Reef. We’ve got this.”

“But it’s- there were people here. So where are the bodies? What were they doing with the Radiolaria?” Brigid stammered out.

“I’ve read some logs. The researchers here were complicit in Clovis’s madness. Or coerced. Honestly, it’s probably a mix of the two. The experiments on Europa are worse than any of the other BrayTech atrocities.”

“The Vex here are different from the other kinds around Sol. And they defend this structure with no apparent direction. They’re not attached to a real Mind, they’re… from here? They- they were human once. They look exactly like Asher’s arm.”

“Yeah. I think this was an initial research site. Or a remote laboratory for experimenting with Radiolaria. At least that’s what I can pull from files. Look, just… Let’s clear up here and get out. This is what I saw. I needed you to see and I was going to show you when it was more convenient. But we’ve been so busy putting out fires everywhere that… There just wasn’t time until now.”

Gella knew better than to say anything. They’d both stayed quiet when she returned time and again to futilely try to help her brethren caught in Savathun’s trap. Still, there were threats to eliminate and secrets yet to uncover in this facility so she pointed ahead towards a winding staircase. Sefi nodded and raised their scout rifle, falling in behind the Hunter. Brigid took up the rear, still shaken and bracing for more uncomfortable truths.

Something new was leading the Vex in the next room. Two imposing, bipedal giants with tendrils and a sturdy appearance registered their approach impassively. The tendrils seemed to twitch momentarily before coordinated fire from Goblins and Hobgoblins cut across the open room at the trio. Brigid barely got a shield up in time but it wouldn't be enough. Then the new Vex frames opened fire with Void blasts which immediately threatened to shatter Brigid's shield. She realized that if it didn't hold, they'd all be torn apart and their Ghosts would be focus fired not long after. She turned to Guy and said calmly, perhaps too evenly, "Fall back. I'll return."

The world narrowed to a long tunnel that terminated in one of the strange new Vex. She felt nanotube sinews tense, storing elastic energy as she prepared to explode. With a powerful kick that dented the floor she took off like a shot, like she was flying. She impacted the automaton at full speed, warping the brasslike metal of its shell with a sickening collision. Impassively, she tore it away, revealing a core beneath. The machine shuddered to a halt after she put her hand through the silica glass containment. Her fist dripping Radiolaria, she turned to the other one. It seemed to lead the small fries so it had to go next. It leapt into the air and with a crackling electrostatic charge somehow propelled itself at Gella feet-first. The crumbling shield wouldn't catch its dive and it would paste the lightly-armored Gella. As though time had slowed, Brigid again prepared a lightning charge. Her bulk threw it off of its dive, slamming it into a wall with a sickening crunch that left it looking like a spider that had been mortally wounded by a swat. As it twitched its ruined frame, Brigid strode up silently and tore its core out as well. She examined it with distant curiosity before callously crushing it, again feeling the cooling against her gauntlet of Radiolaria beginning to shudder and freeze against the terrible cold of this awful place. 

There were more to take apart, and Brigid did so with brutality and efficiency, her fist rendering each Radiolaria pod a leaking, white wreck. A thought occurred to her, as though broadcast to her from a great distance, that these frames were once human beings. However, Brigid coldly refuted the voice, ||they were now simply obstacles to be removed||. The room was clear. But there were still more Vex. Climb, crush, move on. Something vicious animated Brigid as she climbed the next set of stairs, ||welcoming new prey to fell with the detachment of a child taking apart bugs||. The remaining Vex seemed to cower from her, defeated already as they defended their ersatz Gate Lord "leader". It would fall first then the rest would be mopped up ||as insects||. The lead Vex was large, and tough, but it too would fall before repeat blows disabling it piece by piece while the remaining Vex frames tried futilely to shoot her. Dodging and weaving around the overgrown Minotaur's attempts to stomp on her provided enough cover. With a triumphant, brutal leaping slam, the lead Vex exploded in a shower of shrapnel taking out the few remaining survivors of the carnage. Reality came screaming back as the violence faded. Or- no. Brigid realized as the voice died in her Exo throat that she had been screaming. She surveyed the carnage. Vex parts were littered everywhere, shattered as remaining air vapor condensed near the extreme cold that clung to the debris. Hoarfrost extended in a strange shape outward from where her fists were lodged in the metal floor of the lab. It left her still-reforming mind with a very clear understanding of what she had done.

Sefi and Gella arrived shortly afterwards. They both clearly tried not to let their trepidation show, worrying they might threaten their friend's already-fragile state. Sefi was the first to speak, "B… you ok?" They were very pointedly ignoring the small field of jagged crystals that dotted the room.

"I… it…" Brigid was spiraling. Sefi had never seen this before. Brigid had always been the strong one, the steadfast one. When someone strong breaks, it really is true that they break that much harder, mused Sefi to themself.

"Sefi, that wasn't me…"

"Brigid, you're not helping anything by denying what just happened. This kind of thing will just happen again if you try to pretend that this isn't you as well."

"But my body just moved on its own…"

"Mine does that too. It's a trauma response, not possession. You've clearly got some shit you're not dealing with. B, you don't need to protect us from your feelings. You don't need to pretend that nothing fazes you because we go through absolute insanity on a daily basis. It'd be more upsetting if you weren't bothered by everything we've been through lately! Yeah, I struggle a lot. All the time really. But that doesn't mean you should hide your shit from me! I want to help, so stop treating me like a child!"

Brigid sullenly took her helmet off and turned it around to stare at the featureless faceplate. Sefi hadn't seen her face in a while. Brigid somehow looked haggard and worn despite her mechanical body. All of her psychological exhaustion was carried squarely in her slackened frown and distant stare. Her face suddenly changed into an extremely pained grimace and she began to make something like a coughing sound and rested her head against her helmet's exterior.

Gella stepped forward, putting a hand on Sefi's shoulder and nodding at Brigid while signing, "She ok? That normal?"

Sefi turned and responded out loud, "Oh yeah. You've probably never seen an Exo actually 'cry' before. It takes a lot to make us forget our condition for even a second. What you're hearing is basically crying sans the physiological signs thereof." Gella looked confused. Sefi continued, "We can't tear up, have nasal congestion, or have our throats tighten like biological humans can. But her brain, on some level, remembers this impulse. Only, well, doing so reminds you of how far you are from everyone else. Hey Brigid, is it ok if I hug you?" She silently nodded in response. Sefi asked not only because it was the polite thing to do when a trauma survivor is triggered, but also because in this emotional state the Titan could pretty clearly damage them badly if she reacted without thinking. And while Sefi wasn't worried about their own safely that much, hurting them would have been the last thing Brigid's fragile emotional balance needed.

Brigid seemed to relax a little in the smaller Warlock's embrace. "I know you're not ok right now, B, but we should get moving. Why don't we go back to the City for a bit? Grab some food and find something to do down with the people. I think it'd do you some good. We'll talk about this another time, when you're ready. But no trying to run from it, ok? We will have to talk about what just happened." 

Brigid nodded before putting her helmet back on. "Besides," she began after a moment, "I'd rather go grab ramen or something than deal with the tidal wave of Fallen that'll fall on this place as soon as they realize we busted up these Vex."

With that, the trio left the bunker to again fall silent. Similarly silent were the team's channels as they traveled back to Earth. Inside the cockpit of her jumpship, Gella was finally allowing herself to feel the troubling nostalgia that had been plaguing her. It was not so long ago that she ran with Dark Guardians. Seeing both of her fireteam members use Stasis had her rattled, and she looked uncomfortably at her heavy sniper rifle. The last memento she kept of her previous team, the weapon of sorrow sat ominous and silent, propped up in the cabin behind her. Its presence hung heavy behind Gella.

“Marbas,” Gella mumbled to the silent cabin.

A mournful voice answered Gella’s call, “Yes, Gella?”

“What are you thinking about this development?”

Audible surprise crept into Marbas’s tinny voice, “You’re asking me?”

“Is that so surprising? I didn’t listen to you the first time my teammates went dark. We both know how that went.”

“Yes. We do,” he said with no condemnation. Only regret.

“Well?”

“Sefi and Brigid. They’re good people. But so were Bogomil and Ismail. The small compromises we all make with good intentions stain and degrade us over time. But you know where this road can end as well. If you wish to keep them whole, I’d recommend you help them see to their traumas. It’s in our pain and fear that the Darkness festers, particularly when we refuse to address them.” 

Gella silently considered what Marbas had said. The last few months had been making her consider how she treated the Ghost. Her resurrection in a breached space suit on a broken-down jumpship had been so traumatic that she’d named the small orb after a demon because her new life had seemed like a monstrously bad bargain - or perhaps a punishment. That attitude had colored her decisions and her fall. After her gang of Dark Guardians had fallen on each other, she’d been left nearly alone again - just her and this stubborn little voice. Now, she realized this might have been a stroke of good fortune. Brigid had taken her in and it now occurred to her that perhaps she owed her friends something more than fire support. She finally, achingly opened comms with the other two Guardians and said, “I know a couple good bars. I’m buying.”


End file.
